‘Claims against me nothing to do with kids’ says Dave Lee Travis

Dave Lee Travis talks with the media outside his home. Picture: PA

ANGUS HOWARTH

FORMER Radio 1 DJ Dave Lee Travis, who was arrested on suspicion of sexual offences by detectives investigating the Jimmy Savile abuse scandal, has insisted the allegations against him have “nothing to do with kids”.

Travis, 67, who has been taken off the air by his current radio station, Magic AM, spoke to reporters outside his home in Leighton Buzzard, Bedfordshire, yesterday and said he did not want his name associated with “bloody evil” child abuse.

He was arrested on Thursday morning and bailed that evening. The allegations against him are not linked to disgraced TV presenter Savile.

Travis had already vigorously denied allegations, made last month, that he had groped two women while in BBC studios. One alleged he had put his hand up her skirt, while the other said he had “jiggled” her breasts.

He told reporters he “could not believe” what he read in newspapers yesterday linking him to the Savile investigation. “The Savile probe is nothing to do with things I’ve been talking to the police about,” he said.

He said he had been accused of “squeezing the boobs of a couple of women” and added that he was “completely abhorred” by child abuse.

The radio presenter said he had willingly spoken to police and would happily continue to help them.

A spokeswoman for Bauer Media, which owns Magic AM, said: “Bauer Media has decided to take him off air with immediate effect from his Magic AM weekend shows.

“We understand that the allegations about which he was questioned by police pre-date his time as a freelance contributor to Magic AM. While we can make no judgment on the matters under investigation, we believe it would be inappropriate for him to broadcast until they are resolved.”

Travis appeared shocked to learn that reporters outside his home knew about his removal from the airwaves and told them he was “sad” about that decision.

“Oh, you know about that?” he said. “I only found out myself this morning.

“I was sad. Because in a way, you know, it should be business as normal, really. In the face of something like this, you should always be, you know, I know this is going to kill you lot, but, whatever happened to ‘innocent till proved guilty’?”

During his chat with reporters, which lasted almost 30 minutes and which he recorded, Travis distanced himself from Savile, claiming only to have “bumped into him a couple of times a year”.

He said: “Colleagues have said to me about Jimmy Savile, you know, first of all ‘Did you know him well?’ No. Why would I know him well?

“If any of you have ever interviewed Jimmy Savile and got anything more than ‘How’s about? As it happens’ out of him, you’ve done well.

“And he’s the same with everybody. Nobody really knew him. I bumped into him a couple of times a year, something like that, so I’m not in his lap.

“I’m not madly friendly with him. I don’t know where he lived.”

He added: “I don’t know anything about him. He was the one who sailed in and out like a ghost to the BBC.”